Restless Lullaby
by Ms.MaraJade
Summary: [Dragon Quest VIII] Angelo comes to terms with a difficult memory. Prequel companion piece to my story “Trust” but standalone, too. Rated T to be safe.


Author's Notes: My original story of Restless Lullaby was written prior to finding out Angelo's background. Now that I understand this character's past, I feel the need to keep canon with the history the game has provided. I have decided to keep the Alternate Universe version posted and offer this Canon version as well. I leave it to the readers to read whichever one they prefer.

As always, I apologize for any mistakes in continuity of the game and such errors. This is a more canon back story / companion piece to my other story, "Trust."

Disclaimer: I don't own anything. I make no money. I just love Dragon Quest VIII, and I hope the programmers aren't too upset that I continue to visit their world in my imagination.

Summary: Angelo comes to terms with a difficult memory. Canon prequel companion piece to my story "Trust" but standalone, too. Rated T to be safe.

Restless Lullaby

"Enjoy," Angelo offered with a smile. "I'll be back before it gets too late."

The others in the party looked about him curiously for a moment as he moved about the streets. Night was falling, and Hero had been leading them to the inn. The afternoon had more than its share of monsters, and the term "weary" was an understatement. Exhausted covered it better. Walking dead might actually be closer to the truth.

"Just what spell does he know that his stamina keeps so strong?" Jessica asked to the others.

Yangus and Hero simply shrugged their shoulders. They were too tired to spare any words. The party continued in their worn-out momentum to the inn. They didn't dare stop now, or they would risk falling where they were, giving in to the deadly exhaustion that threatened to take them.

Angelo glanced behind him only once, after he was far enough from their view and didn't hear their voices any more. He saw that they had entered the inn and were probably going through the registration process.

The Templar knight placed a hand against the armor shop's wall for support. _Stamina_, he thought. He was just too tired to even laugh at the concept. He wished he had an ounce of the stamina that Jessica accused him of having. He would have gladly rebuked her, watching her cheeks turn that pretty shade of pink when she was embarrassed. But, it would have only turned into an ugly scene had he tried. Both of them were just far too tired for the game tonight.

Taking a heavy breath, Angelo stood from the wall. He didn't know where he wanted to go, but he was too restless to give in to the night. He wasn't even sure why he was so restless. Perhaps a drink of some decent ale would relax him into the sleep he knew he needed. He started off towards the pub.

As he got closer to the building, he could hear the entertaining music from inside. Loud voices sang out of tune and women giggled in response. Angelo felt his familiar old smile trace across his lips. He might actually enjoy this. It had been a while since he stopped for one night and just did what he wanted. He no longer had any time now to do any drinking or gambling…or womanizing for that matter. Hero's insatiable sense of nobility kept them saving towns from monsters while closing the distance between them and Dhoulmagus.

He looked toward the windows, noting the light from inside starting to break upon the dusk outside. He stepped through the door. There were various patrons mulling about. At the bar, he saw four farmers laughing through their drunken discussion. At one of the tables sat two jailers who were engaged in a card game. Across the room at another table, a textile merchant was showing samples of cloth and complaining about them to a somewhat disinterested bard.

Three women moved about the room with mugs and serving trays. One of them caught his eye and winked at him. He smiled inwardly. The woman who winked was blonde with brown eyes. She had a rather common beauty to her appearance. Her plainness had a simple attractiveness. The green and white checkered dress gave away her occupation as a waitress. The ears on her head were bent from usage. The tail on her skirt was worn. Still, she smiled with the genuine warmth of someone who enjoyed her job.

"Can I help you?" she asked. Her voice was deeper than he expected, but it was still full of feminine charm. Angelo detected a certain tone beneath her voice that belied her wistful interest in him.

The Templar knight put on his most endearing smile. With any number of complimentary phrases, she would melt to his charms. He paused for a moment, deciding which phrase to start with.

Then, he did something completely uncharacteristic. He couldn't think of a single word to say. He had no want of a strong drink. He had no want of the company of the girl before him, and he had no want of the card game taking place in the corner.

Angelo was entirely befuddled by this reaction. From the time he was an adolescent, he was charming girls, sneaking ales, and cheating at cards. His tongue-tied behavior was not even a remote inkling of the man he was.

"Are you okay?" she asked, realizing he had a look of confusion over his features.

"Sorry," he apologized quickly. He decided it was best to leave to avoid any further embarrassment. "I just realized the time. I have somewhere else to be."

Turning from the doorway of the pub, he made his tired way back into the streets. How he would have loved to have put his feet up in that pub! The blonde would have been happy to accommodate his every wish. She was no stranger to the longing of a weary male traveler.

So what just happened to him back there? He never turned down such an offer before. That waitress would have made a perfect companion for the night.

Continuing down the street, Angelo figured the battles were beginning to weigh more heavily on him than he first thought. The drain of his magic and energy in the party's constant skirmishes must have started to take some strange toll on his spirit. He thought for certain that the healing spells he and Hero were casting would have countered the problem. It was unusual that his fatigue had not decreased by now.

Moving about the streets with no specific destination, the Templar knight went wherever his feet and his subconscious decided. He was now without thoughts. He was too exhausted to think any more. Having lost his momentum for charming a lady, he found himself irritated as well.

He finally stopped walking and looked up to find the church doors before him. He had half a mind to snort at the ridiculous concept of being in a church when it was the temptations of society he truly wanted at this moment. Still, he held his reaction at bay. He had barely known of any life other than a servant of the Goddess.

The Abbey was not a terrible place by any means. He received three meals a day, clothes on his back, and a warm bed at night. The monks had taken well care of him. Angelo would never think of Abbott Francisco as anything less than a saint.

The problem was that Angelo was not suited to be a monk or a priest or any such leader of the religion. He knew that since age thirteen. It was the moment he laid eyes on AnnaBeth…or was it BethAnne? Either way, he was entirely entranced by her brown eyes and long, brown hair. Her smile melted him in a way he never thought possible, and when she kissed him that night, he knew the life of a monk would never be anything for him.

Staring in lost thoughts at the bowed-cross marking upon the church, Angelo looked at the life he struggled with every day. He truly believed in the Goddess and all She had to offer. He tried his best many times to follow the strict code of the monks and Templars. In the end, he just knew committing to Her in the way that was expected of a Templar was not the right path for him.

Angelo lowered his eyes from the marking. He turned to keep walking when a soft voice sang quietly from inside. The song was familiar to him. It was a lullaby that he had known, even though it was never sung at the Abbey.

_My heart is yours_

_Your heart is mine_

_Tonight you sleep_

_Until the sunshine_

_If you wake before daybreak_

_I'll come to you my dear sweet-cake_

_And I'll rock you back to sleep_

_Hush now, love, no more you weep_

Angelo heard the last word of the song fade into the night. He was overcome by a need to seek out the voice in the house of worship.

Cautiously and quietly, he entered the church. It was abandoned for the most part. One priest moved about setting objects on the altar. There was a nun in a pew toward the front, kneeling in silent prayer. The candles flickered in a non-descript pattern around the room. The walls seemed to wave under their glow. The dim, amber-copper reflection had a soothing effect on whoever entered.

Angelo roamed his eyes more thoroughly around the church. There had to be a mother with a child somewhere inside in order for a song like that to be sung. He knew without a doubt that he had heard the voice inside the church.

Puzzled that only the nun and priest were inside, he made his way to a pew in the back and sat quietly. His eyes watched the movement of the shadows over the Goddess statue at the front of the church.

The eyes of the statue had drawn in his attention. He felt an unusual calm overtake his body. The song played once again. This time, he saw a pair of blue eyes looking into his. A bony finger traced an intricate pattern along his forehead. Ancient words faded quietly while the lullaby she once sang to him as an infant replaced those foreign phrases.

_My heart is yours_

_Your heart is mine_

"Don't ever forget that," she whispered. It was the only way should could talk now. Her voice was strained too far from the sickness to speak anything above a stressed whisper.

_Tonight you sleep_

_Until the sunshine_

"I'm sorry I can't stay much longer."

_If you wake before daybreak_

_I'll come to you my dear sweet-cake_

The blue eyes grew blurry. An intense cough wracked through the fragile and weakened body. She knew the end was approaching soon. A single droplet of warmth fell. It was cold by the time it landed. The child clinging to her let out a saddened burst of tears.

"I'm so sorry, my love."

_And I'll rock you back to sleep_

_Hush now, love, no more you weep_

"Farewell, my child." The blue eyes pulled away. The child watched what was a rapidly fading light in them. She had somehow forced that last bit of life within her to stay until this very point. How she held on for three months was beyond anyone's understanding.

He clung to her and cried into her lifeless body until it turned cold.

Angelo dropped his face in his hands, unable to hide from the memory. Most of the time, he kept that moment dormant and subdued. Ale and women usually helped with that. Every so often, though, it crept back to him. The memory was his last recollection of his mother. She insisted from the moment she grew ill that Angelo needed to spend as much time with her as he could.

His fingertip touched upon his cheek where his mother's tear had fallen that night. It left a permanent chill on his skin. It was like having a scar without any mark.

Tonight, his mother materialized in his memory again. The cruelty of the bond was that it was her death he remembered so vividly. The scene was always the same. He would curl in beside her. She would touch upon his forehead and speak in foreign tongues. And, she would sing to him the lullaby one last time before the endless sleep came for her.

Angelo had begun to think that during those three months she was hallucinating from the sickness or simply going insane from it. Still, he knew his mother's time was short, and even if she wasn't the same woman he remembered as a tiny child, they had a bond. He wanted to be with her until the last moment. He felt it was the only way.

Taking a deep breath, Angelo ran his hands through his loosened hair. The memory had passed now. The calming trance faded from his body, and the statue's eyes were no longer holding his attention. His mother was gone again.

The Templar knight decided that the servant from the pub looked very inviting, and he was going to make her acquaintance the right way this time. He moved to stand when another set of eyes grabbed his attention.

_"Ange…"_

_His name and her breath were captured as his lips came to hers again. She pulled him closer, removing the ribbon from his nearly shoulder-length hair. Her fingers ran through his thick locks._

_His fingers tickled along her neck, sliding her shirt to the edge of her shoulder._

_She pulled back, giggling._

_"Corrina," he pouted, studying her hazel eyes. Fingers from his other hand twirled lazily one of the long, ebon curls that had spilled down her back, "You'll ruin a perfectly romantic moment if you laugh all the time."_

_She traced a fingertip over the seam on the arm of his shirt. "Angelo, romance is what you make of it. Who says it has to be only candles and moonlight?"_

_"What is romance then?" he asked awaiting her usual dictionary-sounding answer._

_"The enjoyment of another's company, usually done in privacy. Laughing is just as romantic as other pleasures."_

_He knew he wanted to get back to those other pleasures. They didn't have long left together. Her family was leaving town in about two weeks, and that was after they arrived only a few days ago. He had a lot of romance he planned to enjoy with her before she departed._

_Angelo leaned forward to keep the moment from fading. Then, he stopped short. He noticed Corrina's hazel eyes were staring hard into his blue irises. She almost appeared to be in a light trance._

_"What are you doing?" Angelo questioned, hoping this distraction would not last long. The evening would grow too late if they stopped every few minutes, and he didn't feel like trying to sneak back into the Abbey at sunrise…again._

_"Your aura is different tonight."_

_"I'm fine," he laughed shaking his head. "It was just a stressful day. I'm supposed to go for the trials for knighthood next week, and they really put me through the gauntlet."_

_Corrina pushed some of his hair from his face. "A vision of your mother troubles you."_

_Angelo released his embrace on her. He stood from the blanket they sat upon and kept his back to her. He had lost all interest now in the rest of the evening. Nobody was supposed to know about that vision. "This is the last time I spend my night with a gypsy."_

_"Intuit," she corrected, standing up behind him. "I'm an Intuit, not a gypsy. We don't rob you for our services."_

_"It doesn't matter. You're poking around my aura without my permission."_

_"Your aura is screaming. I'm not poking anything."_

_"How true," he mumbled._

_"You are callous and rude," she chastised._

_The Templar squire turned back to her. "Corrina, there's nothing to discuss. The vision comes when I least expect it, and it's always the same."_

_"Your mother had knowledge of magic," the Intuit explained, staring blankly at Angelo as though seeing something deep within him. "She left you with a wealth of wisdom. Do you not know this?"_

_"I know my mother was very sick, and for three months I had to sit in her room every night while she spoke crazy and sung…" he stopped short. He never talked about this. How the Hell did Corrina manage to get him to speak so much?_

_She gasped suddenly. "Angelo, you angry, thick-skulled moron!"_

_"Oh, what did I do this time?" he asked, biting down on his irritation._

_"You mother wasn't going crazy! She was imbedding your subconscious with spells."_

_Angelo turned away in anger. He didn't believe that for one moment. He never once saw his mother cast a spell. There were never any spellbooks in the house._

_"Tell me what she did in the ritual," Corrina asked gently, touching his shoulder lightly. "I'll know for certain then."_

_He sighed deeply. They were not going to be doing any romance tonight. Once Corrina got on a topic, it had to be discussed until the end. "Each night, my mother would trace patterns along my forehead and speak in languages I knew nothing about. She would then sing to me a lullaby until I fell asleep."_

_Corrina took her hand away. She stepped back. "Look at me."_

_Angelo reluctantly turned to her. A small, hand-held-sized ball of fire was suddenly thrown at him._

_Instinctively, he held his hand up, and a barrier of light surrounded him._

_"What are you doing?" he demanded._

_"Could you ever do that before?" the Intuit asked. "Besides, it would have been a light hit…nothing more than what you would do waving your hand over a candle flame."_

_Angelo quietly fell to his knees. "What did she do to me?"_

_"With experience, you will unlock all the spells she gave you," Corrina explained as she came to sit next to him. "I can show you a few before I leave, but the rest you must discover through the experience you gain in life."_

_"Why didn't she tell me she knew magic? Why did she leave me these spells in secret?"_

_Corrina grasped his arm tighter than he thought the petite girl could. "I can show you something that will allow you to speak to her and answer your questions."_

_Angelo caught something very resolute in the Inuit's eyes. If he said no, she was going to convince him anyway. "Why would you do this?"_

_"Because your soul needs to rest," she replied simply as though it were the only reason._

_"I'm swearing off gypsies," he sighed._

_"Intuit," she reprimanded. "Intuit."_

_"Then, from now on I'm swearing off any woman who wields magic."_

_Corrina smiled like she knew some secret, and she had no plans to tell him. "Meet me here tomorrow night. I'll bring everything we need."_

Angelo pushed the memories of Corrina aside. He took from his pocket a small book. It was where he had written down various spells and languages that were both ancient and foreign. It contained all the spells that he feared would be difficult to memorize. He had it since he could write. He opened the pages to find one of the spells that Corrina had given him. It was the spell that provided transportation between the Living Realm and the Spirit Realm. His eyes looked over the language. It was ancient and dead. Only he a small handful of Intuits knew the spell now.

He thought briefly back to those two short weeks when Corrina had taught him so much more than what he had learned in any schooling at the Abbey.

The Templar knight took a breath wondering if he would ever have the courage to perform for himself the spell into the Spirit Realm. Corrina told him that it could only be used once. It was a one-time passage into the Spirit Realm and the person requesting the passage had to be absolutely certain they knew what they wanted.

Angelo couldn't take that chance yet. He knew he would have many questions to ask his mother. Until he knew for certain all he wanted revealed, he would not be ready to enter there himself.

His fingers traced the writing on the page lightly. He had the sudden insight that she would need it one day. He didn't know why he knew this. He just knew that one day he would be the bridge between Jessica and the Spirit Realm. It would come at a time when she would need it most, and it would be right.

Closing the book gently, Angelo set it back in his pocket. He stood from the pew and left the church in silence.

Oh, how he was going to receive an earful from Jessica in the morning about being out all night with _stamina_.

And, he welcomed all the insults she could muster.

Angelo smiled with genuine happiness for the first time that night. The fatigue was kept far enough at bay that he had managed to make his way to the inn and lay in his bed.

Women, ale, and gambling were the farthest things from his mind right now as he settled deeper into the mattress. He found peace with himself. As his eyes closed, a silver lock of hair fell before his mother's eyes. The blue of her irises was vibrant and alive. Her face was no longer gaunt and sick but full and colorful. He saw for the briefest second her lips. They were once again full and red. Gone were the cracked and dry lips he last had touch upon his cheek.

"Sleep now, dear Angelo."

The lullaby that once kept him restless now eased him into a calming, deep sleep.

_My heart is yours_

_Your heart is mine_

_Tonight you sleep_

_Until the sunshine_

_If you wake before daybreak_

_I'll come to you my dear sweet-cake_

_And I'll rock you back to sleep_

_Hush now, love, no more you weep_


End file.
